


another name goes up in lights

by kathillards



Series: girls like girls [1]
Category: Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Power Rangers, Power Rangers Zeo
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-16
Updated: 2015-08-16
Packaged: 2018-04-15 00:44:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4586535
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kathillards/pseuds/kathillards
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You wonder if you'll make it out alive. —- KimKat</p>
            </blockquote>





	another name goes up in lights

**(you wonder if you’ll make it out alive)**

_you had it figured out since you were in school  
everybody loves pretty; everybody loves cool_

-:-

The story begins with a pretty girl and the way the world turns around her.

-:-

She leaves you with a coin and a smile and a promise. You tuck the first into your pocket, the second into your heart, and the third you let fly away on the plane that takes her across the country. You’re only sixteen, but you know that promises from pretty girls are only ever meant for breaking.

 _You’re going to be amazing,_ she says the night before, hands clasped in yours, the kind of smile that could put the sun to shame on her lips. _I promise you’ll be okay._

You watch her kiss the boy she loves goodbye and wonder how she can do it. Leave everything to you and run. Trust you with her home, her love, her family, her world. You, a girl forged from secrets and lies; you, a girl who tried to steal to her life; you, a girl cursed to love what you cannot have.

She hugs you once and then she’s gone, and everything that was hers is now yours, except the only thing you have ever really wanted. This is how it always ends. This is the only way for it to end.

-:-

But your story goes on. You fight the monsters, save the day, fall in love again. There’s a boy with pretty eyes and a kind smile who makes your heart flutter, but that’s all it does. You think it’s enough. You are used to love being pain, and this is not.

This feels like happiness, so you accept it into your life. He says, _I think I’m in love with you_ , and you think maybe he is, maybe he could be. Maybe you could be, too.

You ought to know by now that it never goes so smoothly for matchstick girls like you, always half on fire, always ready to burn.

-:-

She calls you up twice a month, sends you her laughter through the phone, stories of another world without monsters, without heartaches, without love. Asks you how her friends are doing, believes you when you say they’re doing great.

 _I miss you_ , you want to say, but the words get stuck in your throat like sand. _I wish you were here_ , but you don’t, not really, because that would mean seeing her. That would mean being near her. That would mean wanting her. _He misses you, too_ , but you know, in your heart, that he doesn’t.

 _I miss you all,_ she says instead, easy as one-two-three. No conflict. No pain. She misses all of you. It’s simple.

There’s a shadow hanging over your head, matchstick girl. You say goodbye and listen to her breathing until the phone clicks and you are left listening to silence.

-:-

Loving girls is different from loving boys. You can’t explain the feeling, the way your heart jumps when he smiles at you, the way it constricts when you think about her. You don’t even really know if you love him, if it’s real, if it’s true. Not just a hangover from a curse that never faded, not just you fooling yourself into believing you can love somebody like him, that you could be worthy of somebody like him.

You’re living on borrowed time. You’re loving him on borrowed time. Every time you kiss him, you taste another girl, a sadness you can’t heal, an ache that doesn’t go away. You wonder if he sees her when he looks at you.

You can’t blame him. You see her in the mirror, too. See her in his smiles. See her in your heart.

It’s your own fault. You fell in love with a girl balancing on top of the world, and this is your price to pay. These are your demons. This is your cross.

-:-

You find echoes of her everywhere. A scarf left in your locker. A joke that goes unfinished when they realize you won’t understand. A photograph in the trophy room.

You find her in Tommy’s bedroom, polaroids tucked away in a drawer next to a letter that broke his heart. In Rocky’s faded laughs, in Adam’s far-off gaze. In Tanya’s quiet questions, in Jason’s heavy heart. And, perhaps most of all, in Billy’s lost smiles and lost sparks and his leaving.

He doesn’t say goodbye to you. You don’t blame him. You wouldn’t have said goodbye to you, either.

-:-

Ballet grounds you, keeps you focused on the movements and the breathing and the performance. You don’t tell the others, but you prefer diving, just a little. Just enough to go to the pool in your free time and conquer your fear again and again until you don’t come up spluttering and choking.

The thing about diving is that the water is freeing. It is salvation in its purest form. It frees you from the confines of a world filled with monsters and heartbreak, from the restraints of living in the shadows of a girl on fire from the sun. The water is blue and blue and blue.

In the pool, you are not pink. You are not in love. You are not a hero.

You swim and swim until you learn how to do it without hating yourself everytime you jump, and slowly, your heart starts to ease itself of its burden. In the water, you can convince yourself that you are in love with a boy who looks at you like you hung the moon, that you never cared about a girl with a heart too big for her body on the other side of the country.

Freedom tastes a lot like lies, but better than bitterness. Nobody ever said you would find truth in the water, anyway.

-:-

She comes to visit once before the time she tries to kill you, and there’s a party on the beach with a bonfire and music and laughter and the city behind you starting to feel like home. She doesn’t talk to the boy she left or to the boy who left her first, but she does talk to you.

 _I missed you_ , nothing but warm smiles and hugs and, _Come on, let’s go out to the water_ , and you leave everyone else behind with the fire and the food, and you pretend you don’t notice the gazes on your back as you do.

The water is chilly and refreshing and laps against your feet like a dream of a dream. She takes your hand and spins around you, dancing and laughing, and she kind of feels like the dream of a dream, too.

 _How have you been?_ but you don’t think she really wants an answer, because she gets distracted by a seashell and when she picks it up, it gleams pink and white in the soft moonlight. _The ocean is for secrets, you know._

You wish you could tell it yours. You wish you could tell her yours.

The words bubble out of you without a warning: _Do you still love him?_ and she freezes, the seashell in her palm the colors of their love, a million answers in her eyes but only one truth.

 _I’ll always love him_ , she says, but it’s not an answer, and you both know it. _He loves you now. Don’t doubt that._

It’s not his love you doubt. Your heart feels like it will burst from the secret you’ve been keeping locked inside since the day you met her and a witch told you to hate her, but you don’t say anything, let her believe everything is fine.

Somebody should have told Rita that girls can like girls, too.

-:-

After you help save her from red eyes and guilt complexes, she finds you outside in the evening air, everyone else inside with the lights and the laughter. It’s becoming a habit, the two of you, out here, alone. You think you should try to break it, but you really don’t have the willpower.

 _Thank you_ , she says, out by the streetlamp that casts a golden glow over her face, _Thank you for saving me._

 _Anytime_ , you want to say, but don’t. _Always_ , you want to say, but can’t. _I’m not in love with him_ , you want to say, but won’t. She leans against the lamp and smiles up at you. Your heart jumps two beats at once.

 _You saved me first_ , is what you say instead, and her smiles fades as she studies you, looks at you like she’s seeing you for the first time – or maybe the last time.

 _You’re lucky_ , she says, and the words knock the breath out of you. That doesn’t sound right. _New powers, new friends, new world. You’ve done so much with what I left you._

 _New monsters_. But she only laughs and waves a hand. _New battles._

 _You can handle it_ , but you don’t know if that’s true. _You can handle anything. You are so strong, Kat. And so brave._

She’s wrong, she’s wrong, she’s wrong – you want to scream, but you can’t because your throat is dry and you have lost all your words. She smiles at you, a little wistful, a little sad, and takes your hand and draws herself up to hug you.

You want to kiss her, but you are not brave enough to tell her you love her. A boy who loves you is inside, waiting for you, and you are not strong enough to break his heart.

She is wrong – you are not the lucky one. She was brave enough to leave first.

-:-

In the end, you leave him, too, or maybe he leaves you. Or maybe you both leave each other and you both leave your home and you both leave the world in the hands of others. Younger, smarter, braver. You look up at a girl with a sunny smile and hopeful eyes and pray she’ll be better at this than you were.

You fly away to London, and you call her when you get there.

 _I broke up with him_ , because you don’t know what else to say. _I’m sorry._

She sighs, a weightless sound. _You have nothing to apologize for_ , like she knew it was coming. Like she knew it wouldn’t last.

 _You gave him to me, didn’t you?_ and she doesn’t answer for long enough that you know you’re right. _I’m sorry I wasted your love._

 _You didn’t_ , she insists. _You love too much, Kat. You could never waste mine._

Maybe she’s right. Your hands are shaking as they clutch the phone, shaking as they hold onto her voice, shaking as the dust settles and the shadows clear and you can see the world ahead of you for the first time since you fell into a curse. Maybe giving up on saving the world made you stronger, made you braver.

 _Come visit me_ , you suggest, and she laughs, and you spend the entire night talking and not once do you think of a boy with pretty eyes whose only mistake was falling in love with you.

-:-

The story ends with you and the world around you and the way she makes you smile.

But now you’re older and stronger and braver, and this time – this time, the story isn’t about witches and curses and boys and letters and heartbreaks.

-:-

This time, the story is about you and your heart, and the girl who happens to have it.

-:-

_another name goes up in lights  
like diamonds in the sky_

— taylor swift, the lucky one


End file.
